Oreb and Zeeb. — The names mean “raven” and “wolf”: but these are common names for warriors among rude tribes, and there is no reason to look on them as names given in scorn by the Israelites. Such names are common among nomads. The capture of these two powerful sheykhs was the result of the second part of the battle, and was not accomplished without a terrible slaughter. See Psalms 73:9-12, where the word rendered “houses” of God should be “pastures” of God. It is remarkable that in this passage there seems to be almost an identification of the victories of Barak and Gideon, as though they were the result of one great combined movement. In the phrase “became as the dung of the earth” we see that tradition preserved a memory of the fertilisation of the ground by the dead bodies (see Note on Judges 4:16; Judges 5:21). The completeness of the victory is also ailuded to in Isaiah 60:4 : “Thou hast broken the yoke of his burden... as in the day of Midian”; and Isaiah 10:26. The brief narrative of Judges perhaps hardly enables us to realise the three acts of this great tragedy of Midianite slaughter — at Gilboa, the Fords, and Karkor.
Upon the rock Oreb. — Rather, at the raven’s rock. Only again mentioned in Isaiah 10:26 : “according to the slaughter of Midian at the rock of Oreb.” Reland identifies it with Orbo, near Bethshean.
To Gideon on the other side Jordan. — i.e., beyond the Jordan (“trans fluenta Jordani,” Vulg.). This notice is given by anticipation, for Gideon’s crossing the Jordan is not mentioned till Judges 8:4. The words literally mean “from beyond the Jordan,” as the LXX. render them (apo peran), but this is idiomatic for “from one place to another,” as in Joshua 13:22, &c-